Issue 4: Iceman No More, Pt 1
by Fallen X-Angels
Summary: Even as Bobby's secondary mutation spirals out of control, the Fallen Angels must battle Weapon X. The fourth issue of Fallen Angels


Fallen Angels

V1, Issue 4

"Iceman, No More" Part 1 of 2

_"Damn it, I can't stop it!" Kitty yelled from her seat at the computer, where she'd been typing frantically, trying to stop the booby trapped system from executing the cavern's self-destruct sequence._

_Bobby cast a nervous glance over his shoulder, while ice continued streaming out of his hands in the direction of the mutates who were trying to make their way in.  "Come on, then, we've gotta get out of here!  Hank's outside with the Blackbird, hovering, but he can't stay there for long, he's under attack."  _

_"No, hold on, maybe this'll work," she protested, and he caught a glimpse of her fingers flying over the keys before turning his attention back to his attackers.  Just keep them off Kitty, he reminded himself as he felt exhaustion setting in.  She's doing the important job, just keep them back…_

_The mutate in front of him, frustrated by his ice shield that she'd been as yet unable to penetrate, fired a concussive shot at the cavern's ceiling instead.  He heard a sickening crack from above, and looked up to see a section of the ceiling coming down.  Almost instinctively, he started to throw up a shield over his head, but it was too late…_

_"Kitty!" he barely had time to yell before everything went black._

Bobby woke up and sat bolt upright.  Talk about a nightmare, he thought, talking a deep breath and trying to settle his nerves.  He really, really had to talk things through with Kitty, he knew...he ran his hand through his hair as he considered it, and felt something sticky on the palm.  Anxiously, he pulled it away from his face to see what it was.

Blood.  

He stared at his hand for a few moments, then, his stomach in knots, stood up and made his way, slowly, to the mirror over the dresser.  He really didn't want to look…

Fuck, but he _really_ didn't want to see that.  The small patch of ice near the corner of his left eye, which he'd been covering with sunglasses for months, had apparently decided to spread up and out overnight; it now radiated, star-like, up to his hairline and back nearly to his ear.  

And that wasn't the worst of it.

The ice on his chest had filled in its gaps.  In a way, that was almost a relief, at least there'd be less bleeding from the small patches of skin isolated amidst the ice.  Those were gone, now.  But…the ice wasn't as translucent as it had been.  He felt it, carefully, with one finger.  It was thicker than it had been, as if it went deeper.  And it had spread.  Backing up from his reflection, Bobby collapsed backwards onto the bed as his knees gave out, and stared up at the ceiling, not really seeing it.

He'd known this was going to happen.  Intellectually, he'd known it for months, no matter how much he tried to deny it.  He'd actually been surprised, when he returned from that goofy dimension that Kurt's father lived in, that'd he'd been able to return to flesh and blood at all.  And had had some hope, for a few days; it had seemed as if there was _less_ ice, rather than more.  

But now.  Damn. He raised his arm for no reason, and let it drop back onto the bed, needing, for some reason, that gesture of futility.  This was it, he knew it.  Jean-Paul'd been right; he didn't have to worry about Kitty, or anything else for that matter.  Because it wouldn't make one damn bit of difference, anyway.  If she wasn't interested in him now, and it was pretty obvious that she wasn't, she sure as hell wouldn't be interested once he was an ice sculpture.

He wondered, still staring at the ceiling, if this was his own fault.  Whether having better control of his powers, at an earlier age, would've made the difference.  Whether having paid attention during one of the neverending danger room sessions he'd joked his way through would have meant that now he'd be better able to control – this.

Whatever.  It really didn't matter now, anyway.  Laying here wasn't going to help anything, either.  Time to go take a shower, while at least _part_ of him could still enjoy the hot water pounding down on him.  Disconsolately, he grabbed the shower supplies he'd been keeping in his and Kurt's room since Jubilee had used up his shampoo the week before, and not even caring enough to grab a bathrobe, opened the door and made his way to the shared bathroom, clad only in his shorts.

Surprisingly, given the amount of traffic that was usually in the hallway in the morning, he encountered no one, and the bathroom was empty.  He wasn't sure how he felt about that; on one hand, he'd been hiding the extent of his secondary mutation for so long it was a relief not to run into anybody.  On the other – damn it, he could really use someone to talk to, right now.  As he locked the door, he briefly considered calling Hank after he finished showering; he knew from everyone who'd had to answer the phone for the last couple of days that his big, blue friend had been calling non-stop.  He shook his head.  After what he'd said to Hank the other day, he wasn't quite ready to face him, not even over the phone.  Not that any of it hadn't been true, he reminded himself, but still…

He turned on the water, and stepped into the shower stall, turning so his back faced the spray.  No sense in taking chances, after all, and why waste the warmth where he couldn't really feel it, anyway.  Damn, but that felt good…

Until suddenly, it didn't.  His internal temperature dropped about sixty degrees in an instant, and the soothing warm water now felt scalding, as if it were literally burning what was left of his skin off his back, off the backs of his legs.  He groped behind him for the knobs, afraid to turn around, but he couldn't seem to reach them.  He fumbled for the door to the shower stall instead, and succeeded in getting it open, started climbing out.  The cooler air hit him abruptly, and it felt good - no, too cold - no, hot, what the…his arms and legs felt heavier, and the back of his neck was burning, suddenly.  The room around him was filling up with steam; no, it wasn't the steam, it was getting darker, damn, what the hell was happening, this wasn't supposed to happen, what the…

_________________________________

Jubilee stood outside the door of the bathroom, wearing a pink fuzzy bathrobe, bunny slippers, and a really irritated expression.  What the hell was the Icicle doing in there, anyway?  

"Damn it, Bobster, open up!  There's only the one shower, remember?  I've got stuff to do today other than stand here and look cute in the hall!" she yelled once again, pounding on the door.  Still no answer.  She stopped pummeling the door, and stared at it instead.

Now that she thought of it, that was odd.  Not that Bobby was overstaying his time in the shower; he'd do that just to irritate her if he knew she was out here.  But he wasn't throwing back lame jokes.  Or insults.  Or even singing off-key.

"Bobby?" she said, concern creeping into her voice as her hand stretched out to the doorknob.  "Bobby, if you _are_ in there, grab a towel or something, 'cause I'm coming in."  Taking a deep breath, she opened the bathroom door, and was hit by a huge cloud of steam.  As it began to dissipate, she saw Bobby, in his ice form, collapsed on the floor.

"Oh my god," she breathed, running in and immediately trying to check his vitals before realizing she couldn't.  "Bobby?  Come on, Bobster, wake up – you can't do this to me. Bobby!"

______________________________________________

"I'm afraid I don't quite understand. If the Sentinels supposedly self-destructed, why the hell was there one in Chicago, and how did it find Husk and Jubilee? The probability of there even being one of those things in existence aside, the probability of no one having reported one in the city until _yesterday_ when it _happened _to find two of our teammates is simply absurd." Jean-Paul was sniffing over his caffeine-free herbal tea.

Caffeine-free herbal tea. Kurt shook his head over his coffee, which was definitely sugary and full of wake-me-up caffeine goodness. He really couldn't understand why the man even bothered drinking that stuff in the morning. "Improbable, perhaps, but it happened nevertheless. I'm not quite certain how to go about discovering where the damn thing came from either, to be honest."

"Well, you'd better think of a way," The Canuck raised his eyebrows over the newspaper he had clutched between his hands, in his typical morning fashion. "Because that thing can't be left to run around this city. There are mutants all over the place, and no one is safe with them on the loose. My sister is locked up, for god's sake, defenseless. What if it found her?"

"If I remember anything about your sister, Jean-Paul, defenseless really isn't the word I'd use," Kurt gave a low chuckle and sipped at his coffee. The man's concern for his sister was bordering on obsessive... but it was actually rather nice to see him _care _about something for once. The Northstar he'd come to know since Jean-Paul had joined the X-Men was something bordering on human-- but mostly because he was moody. His concern for everything-- everything except Bobby, he reminded himself, with a small twinge of uncomfortable guilt-- had previously been expressed by biting sarcasm and complaints. And then they'd come here. And things had changed, for everyone. 

Including himself. 

Perhaps it was a foolish thing to do, hiding. But Kurt Wagner had felt a desperate urge to hide for months now-- he knew it, and he knew that everyone else knew it. He'd been a horrible leader with the X-Men, he'd let opportunities slip through his grasp, he'd become introverted, unhappy, uncertain... he'd never before, in all his life, been _uncertain_.  

Well, perhaps he had once or twice, he conceded, as he remembered the X-Men's encounter with the Beyonder and the crisis of faith that had followed, but certainly never for any length of time. And never in a way that had left him so entirely... empty.

Kurt shook his head, a physical representation of his mental attempt to clear his mind. Reflexively, he searched for something on the table, paperwork, preferably, that could keep his mind from wandering where it was trying to go. Finding nothing, he looked up to the man across the table, who was now scanning stock quotes with icy blue eyes, obviously having forgotten that they'd been discussing anything at all. 

Scheisse. Nothing to distract him here. 

This was his routine, lately. Think about the job. Throw himself into it completely, so that he never had to think about the way the rug had suddenly been pulled out from under him. Think about the team, and all of their issues, because oh, they had issues. Think about Kitty and Bobby, or Jean-Paul and his sister (and... Bobby...), think about Jubilee and what she needed, think about Paige and her husking, think about _anything _that let him forget to feel sorry for himself. Because once it came to mind, all of the things that had begun to unravel while he was at Xavier's... he could feel his life losing cohesion. All of those things he'd depended on, falling apart. No god, no satan, just some ancient war. Lies and mythology. A jealous mutant, locked away to rot in a desert dimension. The angels nothing more than Warren Worthington III, a man he'd known for a good part of his life. 

Perhaps the idea had merit, as a religion, even if it was based on a falsehood. But what of the people who believed, what of the mockery they'd made of the book they were all supposed to believe in? What about what they'd done to him...?

Kurt stood up suddenly, clutching his coffee cup tight, wishing to the god he didn't really believe could help him anymore that he could have _something _to do right now. It was all waiting for phone calls at this point, though. The architect was taken care of yesterday, and the crews were in the back hammering away already, the computer equipment was on order, for the most part, and Kitty was at her own apartment, probably watching TV with Lockheed... 

Jean-Paul looked up at him, raising an eyebrow again. "Something amiss?"

"I feel as if I should go and... search for any sightings of Sentinels since Genosha. There must be a reason for what happened, and if we don't find out what it is, we'll only be taken by surprise again, and maybe it will be one of us alone, and unlucky."

Jean-Paul only shrugged, and returned to his reading. 

Amazing, how he could go from obviously irritated over the improbability of the situation, to completely uncaring. 

Kurt added that to his mental log of personality characteristics, noticing almost all the ones he had for Jean-Paul added up to pretty much one word-- unpredictable-- and moved to leave the room, head to the office, find _something _to do. No more thinking. Something to do.

He was, he realized, becoming what the Americans called "a basket case." But as long as the rest of them didn't know, and he could keep focusing on them, it shouldn't be a problem. Do the job, do it well. He could live for this. It could fill the gap. Perhaps considering this situation with Bobby, Kitty, and Jean-Paul that he had created wouldn't be a bad thing--

But Jubilee came pounding down the hall suddenly, and barreled almost straight into him, breathing hard... _tears _in her eyes. 

"_Mein__ Gott, Liebling_!" Kurt breathed as she threw herself at him, into his arms. He wrapped his free arm around her, and barely felt the scalding coffee as it spilled onto his other arm, seeped under his fur, and burned him. "What has happened?"

"It's Bobby," She sounded nearly hysterical. "Something's wrong with him, he's totally iced up and on the floor of the bathroom. Oh god Kurt, something's wrong with him, he's not answering me. I don't know what's wrong with him."

Kurt felt, more than saw, Jean-Paul streak by them in a flash of vague light and wind. And then he heard the man's chair crash onto the floor, a moment later.

Suddenly, as he moved to follow their resident speedster, Jubilee's small hand in his own and his heart in his throat, Nightcrawler remembered what he'd been told as a child, so many years ago. Be careful what you wish for. It just may come true.

_______________________________________________

"Jean-Paul, we can't all go," he heard Kurt saying, somewhere behind him. 

But he wasn't really listening, despite the fact that he _heard _him. 

_Bobby, don't you _dare _do this to us. Don't you _dare. 

He stood straight, the lifeless, frozen form of Bobby Drake, now covered by a towel from the wall, in his arms. He'd checked for a heartbeat. Nothing. He'd checked for breathing. Something... but not much. Just a faint rising and falling of the crystalline chest, just enough to let them know that Bobby was not dead. 

_Not dead. Oh god, he's not dead. Bobby, if you die on us, I'll kill you._

"I don't give a fuck who stays then, Kurt, but I'm going," he growled as he carried the dead weight in his arms down the hall, and straight toward the door. 

_Have to get him to the hospital. Now. Chrisse, Bobby, please be ok..._

"God, what happened to him?!" Paige was suddenly in his path, staring at them, green eyes wide and obviously terrified. 

"We don't know. Paige, stay here, we're going to the hospital." He knew it was short, he knew it sounded mean. He didn't give a fuck. 

She only nodded at him, and backed out of the hallway immediately. "Call me when you find anything out. He's ok, right?"

Jean-Paul heard Kurt answer her. But he didn't hear what was said. Bobby's cold was seeping into his blood now, he could feel it. Under his skin, in his veins, soon it would be in his bones. Making the little hairs on his arms stand straight, as he held him a little tighter. He was heavy in this form. But Jean-Paul was strong, much stronger than his trim frame would allow anyone to believe. And he wasn't putting Bobby down until he was at the hospital. Wasn't leaving him until he was ok. 

_Jesus Christ, Bobby. Just be ok. Mon dieu, just be ok._

_____________________________________________

"I'm... not quite certain what to make of this..."

Jean-Paul was standing on the opposite side of the bed from Dr. Zachary Rai, the doctor he'd met on his last visit to Jeanne-Marie, staring him down impatiently. The doctor had seen them coming in, and insisted that he could help... and was now staring at Bobby hard. Jean-Paul watched, trying to regulate his often hyperactive systems, his heart thudding like the organ would erupt from his chest at any moment, his lungs pulling double time, making him feel like he was about to hyperventilate. He could barely stop looking at Bobby's horrifyingly still form, completely covered, completely made of flawless, shining ice. At any other time, it would've been beautiful. 

But now, it was terrifying. Cold. Lifeless. Hard. 

Jean-Paul supressed a shiver, uncertain if it was due to the cold emanating from the body of his lifeless teammate on the bed before him, or the even more disturbing sight of him in this state. 

"There is something... inside of him...," Dr. Rai was saying now, in low, measured tones. 

_Doctor tones_, Jean-Paul thought impatiently. _Placating tones._He looked up, expecting to see the strangely pale hazel eyes of the otherwise dark doctor, and had to suppress a gasp of shock. The man was still staring down, into Bobby's chest, but the irises of his eyes were no longer hazel. They were, without question, as golden as Kurt's, if a bit warmer in tone. Small flecks of darker brown and gold swam about the irises, which had grown large as the pupil shrunk to the size of a pinpoint within them. For just a moment, the Canadian mutant found himself utterly fascinated by the sight of the doctor's power at work. 

It passed quickly enough, however, as another shiver raced down his spine. He opened his mouth to demand an explanation of just what was _inside _of Bobby--

But was cut off by a strangely level-sounding Kurt Wagner, from behind him. "What is it that you see, Doctor Rai?"

"Please, call me Zach," The doctor muttered, obviously mesmerized by the problem of what he was seeing. 

"What is it that you see, _Zach_," Kurt corrected himself. On a normal day, Jean-Paul knew, he would've heard a smile in that voice. But today, there was only the empty echo of something that used to be Kurt's sense of humor. It came out dry. 

Dr. Rai shook his head once, narrowed his golden eyes for a moment, and then flicked his eyes up to Jean-Paul and Kurt, staring at him over the frozen body on the bed. He seemed to be considering something for a moment, something utterly impossible. Something he didn't know how to articulate.

Jean-Paul nearly launched himself over the bed at the young man to threaten to _beat _the information out of him, he was feeling so... sped up. He felt his hands twitch, and suddenly felt Jubilee at his side, felt her step up to the bed beside him and wrap her arms around one of his, like a little girl might.

He looked down at her and saw the tears threatening to overflow in her child-like blue eyes.

It was all he could do not to scream. 

_Bobby, you son of a bitch.__ Wake up. Wake up or I'm coming after you._

"There is something inside of him, like I said. Where his veins should be. Very small... machines, really. It's hard to say, I've never seen anything like them before. They _look _to me like viruses but... they're definitely not organic. Their structure is... well, yes. That of tiny machines." 

Jean-Paul looked back up to the doctor, whose eyes had returned to their usual, less startling hazel tones. "Mechanical viruses?" He whispered, feeling like the words were choking him. "But... we were... we thought..."

"We assumed," Kurt explained, "That Bobby's recent difficulties had to do with his mutation. A secondary mutation, in fact."

"How long has he been experiencing difficulties?" The doctor asked, heavy black brows drawing down in a thoughtful expression. 

"Like... forever," Jubilee shook her head, eyes latched on to Bobby's perfect, chiseled in ice face as if for dear life.

"Since a battle with a certain Black Tom Cassidy," Kurt explained. "His secondary mutation... well, it's not worth telling the entire story, but he also pierced one of our former teammates, Archangel, who experienced a secondary mutation almost immediately following, activating a dormant healing factor."

"And he's not blue anymore," Jubilee muttered, obviously halfway out of the conversation, still clutching at Jean-Paul's arm.

"Warren Worthington III, yes, I'm familiar with him. I hadn't heard of this secondary mutation but...," Dr. Rai trailed off and raked a hand through his dark hair, obviously getting impatient with himself. "The point here is, that I don't think this problem originates from inside Mr. Drake here. I think the problem was introduced from somewhere else. And I can see it."

"What can you _do _about it, though?" Jean-Paul gritted his teeth against the answer he knew was coming. 

And sure enough, the young doctor only shook his head, and pulled at his thick hair some more, until it was standing totally on end. "That's just it... I don't _know_."

___________________________________________________________

Kitty rang the doorbell at Jean-Paul's house, wishing someone had thought to give her a key, and stood there, and waited for someone to come and open it.  She heard the sound of construction going on, and grinned; apparently when you had as much money to throw around as Jean-Paul Beaubier, building permits became meaningless.   Still, she was relieved.  Hopefully they'd have the addition built on soon, and she could move in.

It wasn't that she disliked her apartment; the place meant a lot to her, actually.  She'd wanted to be independent, to live a real life, in the real world, and her apartment was a tangible reminder that she'd been doing it.  But now – the reporters were everywhere, badgering her every time she emerged, asking her questions about her aborted campaign, about the X-Men, about her expulsion from the university.  And the protestors were worse.  Purity members had been camped outside non-stop for the last several days; she'd actually been afraid to let Lockheed out, and her poor dragon was going stir-crazy in the house.  Dylan had been adament, had stated that there was no way he was giving in to a bunch of brainless fanatics, but she couldn't let him pay the price of her exposure.  Already, the other tenants were beginning to complain, and she wouldn't be able to live with herself if they moved out, or someone got hurt, just because of her.  Not after everything Dylan had done for her.  It was just lucky that Xi'an and her siblings had already left; they'd be at risk, living there as things were now.

Getting impatient, she rang the doorbell again, and seconds later Paige opened the door.

"Did you forget something?  I was out back – oh, it's you," Paige said distractedly, peering at her with eyes half closed against the morning sun. 

"Yeah, just me.  No one gave me a key – sorry.  Hey, what happened to your arm?" Kitty asked, noticing a large white bandage wrapped around the other girl's arm, about halfway between her elbow and her wrist.

"This?  Oh, tried something yesterday, and it didn't work quite as well as I'd hoped," Paige answered, shrugging.  "Effective enough, but I still have some bugs to work out, apparently.  Coming in?" she asked, backing up and holding the door open.

"Sure.  Did you guys have a practice last night or something?  No one said anything or I'd have stayed.  You and Jubilee were still at the mall when I left – I had some friends coming over, and I really didn't want to stick around for Bobby's burnt potatoes, anyway," she added defensively.  In truth, she'd originally planned on staying all evening – and would have, if she'd known there was going to be a practice session.  Some simulated combat would've gone a long way toward working out her aggression and frustration over the loss of her new life.  But between Jean-Paul's scowls and Bobby's apparent indifference, she'd decided to go home and face the protesters instead.  She'd called Shola and Tom as soon as she got home; they'd been leaving non-stop messages on her answering machine the last few days, checking to make sure she was ok after everything that had happened.  Once she told them what was going on they'd insisted on coming over to hear the whole story.  But Paige didn't need to know that.  Nor, Kitty guessed, did she want to; Paige seemed to have some issues about her joining the team that she didn't even pretend to understand, and couldn't bring herself to care about at this point.  Either the other girl would work them out herself or confront her with them, eventually.  Given all the confrontations she'd been involved in, recently, eventually would be soon enough.

"No, we just had a run in with a Sentinel at the mall," Paige replied, and Kitty could hear the satisfaction in her voice.  "Jubilee and I took care of it, no big deal."

"A Sentinel?" Kitty asked, astonished.  "Was it one of the Next Generation ones from Genosha?"

She saw Paige flip around, her eyebrows raised.  "How did you know?"

"We had a run in with them a month or so ago on campus," Kitty answered, her brow furrowing.  "But we thought they were all destroyed.  Damn, I wonder if this has anything to do with what Tom was saying last night about Purity – is Kurt here?" she asked, glancing around Paige.

"No, he, J-P, and Jubilee took Bobby to the hospital," she answered curtly.  "What do you mean, you had a run in with them?  And who's Tom, and what did he say about Purity?"

"What do you mean they took Bobby to the hospital?" Kitty asked, ignoring Paige's other questions as so much background noise and centering in on her first statement.  "What's wrong with him?  Is he ok?"

Paige looked at her oddly.  "I don't know, exactly, maybe something about his secondary mutation, he was all frozen.  No one had time to tell me much, they just carried him out and told me to hold down the fort. They said they'd call, but they haven't yet."

"Where did they take him?" Kitty asked, suddenly experiencing a sick, nervous feeling in her stomach with which she was far too familiar.  God, no.  Not Bobby…

"Chicago Institute for Metahuman Research," Paige replied, and Kitty turned and ran out of the house.  

_________________________________

"Ah wonder what that was all about?" Paige asked herself aloud as she watched Kitty run back to her car and phase through the door in her haste.  "Ah didn't even know she really _knew_ Bobby.  It's not like Kurt said to call her, or anything."  Realizing that the accent she'd worked so hard on suppressing was sneaking in, just as it always did when she was upset, she silently kicked herself and went back into the house, slamming the door behind her.  Damn Kitty Pryde.  

Still fuming, she made her way to the back door and went out into the yard, where a huge hole representing the location of the new wing was currently being excavated.  Jean-Paul had entrusted her to keep an eye on the remodeling progress, and that was exactly what she planned to do.  She had to do something to keep her mind off the fact that one of her teammates had just been rushed to the hospital and she had no idea why. Or, for that matter, if he was going to be alright. She vowed to call Jean-Paul's cell phone if she didn't hear from the man in another hour, as she surveyed the wreckage of the back yard for a moment. Keeping an eye on a huge hole in the ground probably wasn't going to be enough to keep her mind off of things for more than a few minutes. But, she reminded herself as she picked up the laptop she'd left on the umbrella covered patio table when she'd gone in to answer the doorbell, she was sure he wouldn't object if she did a little research at the same time.  There had to be some reference to this latest incursion of Sentinels into Chicago, other than the one in Kitty Pryde's head.  And damned if she wasn't going to find it.

_________________________________

Jubilee leaned against the window sill in the hospital room, biting her lip and watching Bobby's frozen face for any sign of returning consciousness even as the others discussed his situation on the opposite side of the room.  She knew if Paige had been here, she'd be in the middle of the discussion, with all sorts of interesting information to throw in on nanotechnology that she'd gleaned from some mysterious source on the 'net, but she felt kind of…remote from the whole conversation.  For once, she didn't even care that no one was making any effort to include her.  She didn't want to talk to them, anyway.  

When Bobby'd joked, just a couple of days before, about going to the great snow-cone maker in the sky, or something like that, she'd written it off as him being melodramatic.  I mean, no one _died_ from secondary mutations, right?  It was like dying from angst; everyone had said all these years that Scott would, but he never had, he just got angstier.  People died from being in explosions, or crucified on the front lawn, or from the Legacy Virus.  Not from mutations.  

But now they were saying it might not be a secondary mutation, after all.  Assuming she'd understood them right, and she thought she had, though she hadn't been paying much attention.  And that brought the whole thing to a whole new level.  She didn't personally _know_ anyone who had died from having their body invaded by nannites, but she wasn't about to rule it out, either.

Unfortunately, other than stand here and wait, there wasn't a whole lot she could do.  She wanted to at least reach out and hold Bobby's hand, but to be honest, she wasn't entirely sure it was a good idea, and felt uncomfortable interrupting to ask.  After all, he might melt or something.

She wasn't entirely sure he wouldn't prefer that to this, but she wasn't ready to give up on him, either.  I mean, jeez, he'd had his body blown up a couple of weeks ago, and he'd put it back together good as new.  Or nearly, at least.  Why shouldn't he get through this just fine?

He'd better, that was all, she decided, glaring down at him with determination.  Or he'd be answering to her.  Because she really, really couldn't deal with another one of her friends dying.  Not now.

"I don't know; I'm afraid I'm no real expert on nanotechnology," Dr. Rai was saying, and she looked up to see what the others were talking about.  Johnny looked positively livid, as if he were trying to keep himself from strangling the guy, and Jubilee was surprised.  Not that Johnny had feelings; she'd seen them when he talked about his sister the psycho, after all.  But that he had feelings about one of his teammates…damn, that was pretty much unprecedented, as far as she knew.  She filed it away as something to think about later, switched her gaze over to Kurt's face.

Which looked as if he were in pain.  Well, she could understand that.  She wasn't feeling too well herself.  She wondered, suddenly, if Bobby could feel anything.

"Are they hurting him?" she asked abruptly, and all three men turned to stare at her, as if they'd forgotten she was even here.  Another time, she might've found that funny.  She knew Bobby would have, too.

"Are what hurting who, Jubilee?" Kurt asked, confused.

"The nannites.  I mean, I just wondered…" her voice trailed off, and she stood there, unconsciously rubbing the back of her right hand with her left. 

"I don't suppose they're teaching him to crochet, Jubilation," Jean-Paul replied caustically before turning back to the doctor.  "Surely there must be something…"

"I don't _know_," the doctor replied, pushing his hand through his already mussed hair in a gesture that was just, so Bobby that Jubilee wanted to scream.  "I already told you, this isn't my area of expertise…"

And suddenly, Jubilee realized there was something _she_ could do, something that none of these morons would consider until it was far too late.  "I'm going out for some air," she told Kurt, and he nodded.  As she walked towards the door, she paused for just a split second behind Jean-Paul, and with an ease earned by time spent living in a shopping mall, nicked the cell phone from his belt and kept walking.

Once she got into the corridor, she flipped the phone open and dialed a familiar number.

"Xavier Institute, Laboratory Sciences Department," she heard, and felt a feeling of warmth wash over her.  Everything would be ok, now.  She just knew it.

"Hank?  This is Jubilee.  It's about Bobby…"

_________________________________

_The small scrap-metal robots were written off as a hoax by University officials, but some witnesses say--_

Paige looked up in annoyance from the website she was reading, that of some Chicago gossip rag or other, roughly equivalent to the _National Enquirer_, when she heard the doorbell ringing inside. Yet again.

She looked at the time in the corner of her LCD screen, noticed that it hadn't even been a half hour since Kitty Pryde had run out of the house like it was on fire, and rolled her eyes. Well, maybe she'd at _least _been to the hospital and back, and she could let Paige know how Bobby was doing... or what the hell had happened to him in the first place, which would also be nice. Not that she minded being the one to stay at home and hold down the fort, Jean-Paul had given the orders and she was happy to follow them, since they seemed logical, but honestly, this was getting ridiculous...

Paige half-ran through the house, wondering what the hell Kitty could've left behind that she needed to come back for (_probably forgot the name of the hospital, she was in such a hurry to get out of here._) When she hit the door, she started complaining as she opened it. "God, Kit, you were just here, can't you--"

But was promptly cut off by a tall, male figure in a black leather trench coat falling forward into her arms. 

She let out a small "Uff!" sound, due to both surprise and impact, but caught him nonetheless, in both her arms, and struggled to stand him upright. Her mind was racing as her stomach turned to stone, and she briefly considered husking into a more... solid form before interacting with this strange man any more. But when she braced him up against her, slid her hand under one of his arms, she felt something wet, sticky. Not water, too viscous. She looked over the leather-clad shoulder propped against her, over the mess of tousled brown hair, and saw red all over her hand. 

No time to think, this could be _very _bad. It could be a trap. He could be a living bomb. He could be an agent of whoever sent that Sentinel. He could be...

The man's head lolled, face still to the ground, and he made a small sound, like he wanted to speak, but couldn't remember how.

And her stomach felt like it would drop into her feet. He could be dying.

She pulled him inside, and he took a few stumbling steps to try and aid her, put an arm around her neck, with painful slowness, then she kicked the door shut. With only a brief thought for Jean-Paul's fine upholstery, she helped him to the nearest couch, and started pulling off his jacket as best she could, with the limited aid he could give her, to get at his wound.

She knew it was stupid. She should have shut the door and called the others, shouldn't have just let him in.  

But even wounded, the way he moved... reminded her...

He looked up at her now, and she froze. A handsome young man, under the dirt and blood; it was obvious. _Very _handsome. But it was the eyes that caught her. Brown, but not dark opaque brown. A kind of light-filled translucent brown, like in a stained glass window on a sunny day. 

She'd loved those eyes, once.

"Yer don't know 'ow good it is ter see yer, Sunshine."

He spoke the words. With full, pouty lips. With a mouth that begged to be kissed.

She couldn't believe what she was seeing. What she was hearing. She'd never "heard" him speak before. Her heart jumped into her throat, half in panic, half with joy to see him... whole. He'd wanted it. She wanted it for him, if it made him happy... but... "Jono... Jono oh my god... what happened?"

"It weren't…quite as easy…to infiltrate Weapon X…as I thought," he finally managed to say, choking in air between words, and her heart sank.    

"They figured out you were a mole?" she asked, already knowing the answer but asking anyway, if only so she could have time to analyze her own feelings.  Those eyes, so familiar, but in a face she'd never seen before…it made everything feel awkward, though she knew it shouldn't.  It _was_ Jono, after all.  But…it wasn't.

"Guess I'm just not the spy I thought I was," he answered weakly, but she thought he sounded somewhat stronger, now that he'd caught his breath.  "I was comin' back from meetin' with Wolverine, and…they must've been suspicious, they'd tailed me.  No, don't worry 'bout that," he said, pushing her hand away as she tried to pull up his shirt and see his wound.  "Wild Child took a swipe at me, but it ain't serious.  I'm just worn out."

"But why," Paige began, and realized her voice sounded panicked.  This was the last thing she'd expected today.  For some reason, having her ex-boyfriend show up on the doorstep hadn't been on her agenda.  Her ex-boyfriend, with a whole, handsome face…she stopped and took a deep breath, let it out, and began again.  "Why did y'all come here?  Why not back to Westchester?  Ah mean – I mean," she corrected herself self-consciously, "I would've thought you'd have gone back to the Mansion, let the X-Men know.  How did you know we were here, anyway?"

Jono shrugged, and winced.  "Weapon X knows yer 'ere, Sunshine.  They knew even 'fore Logan told me.  They've been keepin' tabs on Aurora, want her back.  As for why I came here…well, yer should know that one.  And I figured this wouldn't be the first place they looked for me."  
  


"Weapon X knows?" she asked, astonished.  "Quick…Jono, is there any chance they followed you?"  He shrugged again, leaning back on the couch as if about to fall asleep.  "Damn it, Jono – wake up!  Damn, of all the lousy timing…why the hell didn't you go back to the mansion, they have defenses…where's the damn phone anyway?" she asked, then remembered she'd left it outside on the table.  "Gotta call Jean-Paul," she said aloud as she rushed outside to get it.  She brought it back in, began dialing frantically even as she peered over at Jono, who'd slumped on the couch.  She couldn't tell for certain if he was asleep or not, and only wondered, given his exhaustion, how he'd managed to get there at all.

"Fallen Angels hotline!" she heard Jubilee say.  "Hang on one sec – I dunno, Johnny, maybe it fell out of your pocket and I picked it up?  Ok, fine, here," she added, and Paige could hear the phone being handed off.  

"This is Jean-Paul," she heard, his voice sounding even more irritated than usual.  "May I help you?"

"It's Paige, Jean-Paul.  We've got a situation, here.  Jono showed up on the doorstep, he's on the run from Weapon X, and he thinks they may be on the way."

She heard him say something her limited French couldn't translate, but she took it as a curse.  "Une moment, Paige," he said, and the next thing she knew Kurt's voice was coming out of the phone.  

"Paige, first of all, is Jonothan alright?"

"He's bleeding a little, but he says it's nothing serious," she admitted, wishing she'd had a better opportunity to check for herself.  She glanced over at him, saw that he was definitely asleep.  "He's exhausted, though – he fell asleep almost as soon as he sat down."

"Jean-Paul said he believes that Weapon X may have followed him?" Kurt asked, and she sighed.  How to answer?  He hadn't _exactly_ said that, she had to admit.    
  


"He doesn't know," she admitted.  "But they know where we are.  It seems logical that they'd realize he might come here."

"You're right," Kurt said, and she detected a hint of surprise in his voice.  "We'll be there shortly.  In the meantime, send the workers home; we don't need any unnecessary innocent bystanders if things escalate.  And see if you can gather some more information from Jono.  And Husk…"

"Yes?" she asked, waiting for him to comment on how she'd acted irresponsibly, letting Jono into the house and essentially painting a target on it as a result.

"Good work."  He hung up before she could reply, and she stood there, staring at the phone for a few seconds before setting it down and heading outside.  But, despite everything, she had a smile on her face.

___________________________________

"I am _not_ leaving," Jean-Paul said again, and Kurt glared at him.  Hard.

"I understand your desire to be here with Bobby," he said finally, seeing the stubborn determination in J-P's eyes, and meeting it with an equally stubborn stare of his own.  "But there is little, if anything, that we can do here to help, and Paige is facing an imminent threat.  She needs our assistance, and we _will_ go."  Actually, he felt the best thing for everyone would be for Jean-Paul to _not_ be here; apparently when his teammate cared for someone, there was no half-way about it.  His nearly hysterical demands that Dr. Rai _do something_ were helping no one, and making the doctor, who had been more than helpful, very uncomfortable.

"Take her, then," Jean-Paul insisted, gesturing at Jubilee, who had returned to her station at Bobby's side and who looked, Kurt thought, as if she were trying to will him back to consciousness.  He shook his head.

"Nein.  We can get there much faster if you fly us," Kurt began, but just then Kitty phased through the door, causing Dr. Rai to quite literally jump backwards as she appeared right in front of him.

"What happened?  Paige just told me Bobby was here," she asked, turning to face Kurt, "but she said she didn't have any other information."

"Nein, it's ok," Kurt said to the bewildered Dr. Rai, who had opened his mouth to protest Kitty's sudden appearance.  "She's with us."  In the meantime, Jubilee had half-run across the room and thrown herself into Kitty's arms, much to the older girl's evident surprise.  

"I found Bobby unconscious in the bathroom this morning, all iced up.  We thought it was his secondary mutation, but now they're saying they aren't so sure," she rambled, tears flowing.  "He can't die, Kitty, he just can't…"  Kurt felt horrible.  He'd been so wrapped up in the situation that he hadn't really considered Jubilee's recent history, and how she'd be feeling about it.  He knew that he himself was shaken; Bobby's condition just brought to the forefront just how much he _longed_ to pray to God for support through this time, for the help Bobby needed.  And he…couldn't.  He just couldn't.  And it was tearing him up inside; the battle between what his heart insisted he do and what his intellect wouldn't allow.  

"Of course he's not going to die," Kitty answered with fake-confidence as she hugged Jubilee and began stroking her hair, rather like she would her dragon when she was upset, Kurt realized.  "What secondary mutation?" she asked, puzzled, but as Kurt opened his mouth to reply Jean-Paul interrupted.

"Why do you care?  You haven't even spoken with him since you arrived, even though you must realize how it's been tearing him apart.  Oh, forget this," he added, turning back to Kurt, and leaving Kitty with her mouth hanging open in shock.  "We _will_ return," he told Kurt in a tone that brooked no disagreement. 

"We will, mein freund.  _After_ we have made certain that Paige is safe."

He saw Jean-Paul nod, and cast one last glance at Bobby before turning to make his way out of the room.  Kitty had her arm wrapped around Jubilee's shoulders, already discussing Bobby's condition with Dr. Rai.  

Kurt turned, one last time, towards the bed where Bobby lay in frozen stillness.  "Be well, mein freund," he said.  And wished he could add, "I will pray for you."  

_________________________________________________

Jean-Paul made a concerted effort to focus, as he came up on the house. He was flying as fast as he could, without knocking Kurt out from lack of oxygen, despite a rather wicked wish to make things just a little uncomfortable for other man, at the moment. The sooner the damned elf realized that Paige could handle herself, and her ex-boyfriend, the sooner they could get back...

Though why he wanted to get back, he wasn't certain. If he didn't know better, logically, he would've sworn that his heart was aching, just from looking at Bobby. Unconscious. Iced up. Practically comatose. With small "nannites" in his frozen blood, whatever the hell that meant. But he could feel it. Physically. In his chest. 

"Damn," Kurt growled, suddenly. "Jean-Paul, was ist..?"

Forcing himself to focus on the world around him, Jean-Paul scanned the area near the house... and up in the sky, saw just the thing he hadn't believed would be possible. Green, winged and insanely out of place, coming straight for them, like something out of a damned theme park attraction. "Sauron."

Everything in him automatically prepared for a battle-- instinct earned over long years fighting super-villains and magical beings and every other evil imaginable. He could feel the very molecules in his body preparing to speed him, preparing to create light, to flash, to fly harder and faster. He didn't even have to think about it, not anymore. 

But his mind was spinning. It wasn't supposed to happen like this. She was supposed to be fine. And they were supposed to go back, to Bobby...

"_Calisse__ de Tabarnack..._," He swore aloud, as reality smacked him in the face. "Paige is in trouble." 

"Take care of him," Kurt commanded, then disappeared with a loud bamf, leaving a cloud of brimstone. Jean-Paul was out of the smoke before the sound had even finished, and let his mutation do what it did best. No holding back. 

Northstar knew what it looked like when he sped up-- Jeanne-Marie had been close to his speed, once upon a time, and he'd seen her do it enough times. He would blur, and suddenly appear somewhere else. Sauron would never see him coming. If he was wrong about that, of course, he could very easily end up falling awfully fucking far, and crashing through his own roof when the saurian mutant got near enough to create his vampiric field. But Jean-Paul wasn't about to fuck around. There was too much at stake now, too much he had to do. He sped himself in fast forward, and was on Sauron in an instant, behind him, pummelling him where his arm and wing joints reached his shoulders with both fists. Sauron was bleeding and broken before he even knew Jean-Paul was on him, despite his enhanced strength. Being pounded one-hundred times in the space of a second would slow almost anyone down, and Northstar knew it.  

The flying lizard gave a quick screech, inhuman and blood-curdling, once he finally felt what had been done to him, and Jean-Paul knew that he had a split second before he would get hit with some kind of concussive, energy draining blast...

He sped up once again, using the force of his inertia to flip heels over head, and brought his boot down into his adversary's eyes with a force that had the other mutant reeling downward. Sauron flapped one wing, and the other arm hung limply to his side, as he screeched in pain. 

Northstar followed him down for a moment, closely. And then he felt it.

It felt like the blood had all drained out of his head. Like someone was sitting on his chest. And it was only getting worse.

Knowing it was his last chance, the speedster pushed downward with everything he had left in him. If he couldn't outrun Sauron's psychic vampire field, he would at least take that pterodactyl fuck down with him. He could feel it, the energy, draining. The figure below him became a blur, green and squaking, and within a split second, before the winged creature could even have seen him, Jean-Paul connected with his back. Feet first. Hard. 

Something snapped, and Jean-Paul could suddenly breathe, and a wave of warmth swept through him. He stopped himself from his dangerously sped up descent with only a moment to spare. 

Sauron stopped himself, Northstar was happy to notice, through his deep breath of relief, by landing face down in the grass of his front yard. 

Not for the first time in his life, Jean-Paul Beaubier thanked whatever god was out there that his powers lent him the element of surprise. He left the saurian prone, on the ground, and followed the sound of voices into the backyard, in a blink of the eye, entirely focused on the job at hand.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Jonothan Starsmore was not having the best day of his life.

Or the best week, for that matter. He was tired. He was in pain. He was an absolutely shit excuse for a spy. He had led the bad guys straight to the girl he was pretty sure was the love of his life. And he was under attack by Wild Child-- the most deranged little bastard he'd ever met in his life.

Part of him wanted to unleash it, all that power inside of him. He knew damn well he'd never reached his potential-- as Ev, bless him, had proven with such ease. And he knew damn well that he could... but he also knew damn well the kind of _very _bad things that could happen when his powers got out of control. For example, half of his body, or an entire wing of a school, simply blown up. 

The face, the chest, they were all still very new. But they certainly weren't under fucking warrantee. And he didn't think Paige and her new playmates would enjoy it too much if he leveled the new domicile. And one or the other would inevitably happen, if he unleashed right now. Because he didn't have the energy to control it at the moment. He'd be just pure, raw power.

And Wild Child was certainly doing his best to let Jono know he wanted a face full of it. 

Days now, he'd been running. Probably some ruddy chip buried in his skull somewhere, giving up the game. Telling them just where to find him, every day, every night. He hadn't slept, hadn't eaten. He just ran, any way he could. All he could think was that he had to get to Paige. 

And now he was here... and they were too. And Jesus, he shouldn't have come here. Should've just died. Let his secrets die with him.

He deserved to die, after all. After what he'd done. 

A loud, familiar, and oddly comforting sound cracked behind him, followed instantly by the smell of sulfur. Jono nearly cried with relief as he ducked under Wild Child's latest flying leap, avoiding those vicious claws by only centimeters. Fucking nutter, that one. Course, not being able to talk would drive a man insane. He knew that from personal experience, when his psi abilities got cut off.  Couple that with a feral mutation and a past as a violent criminal/member of Gamma and Alpha Flight (which, from what Jono had heard, could make anyone insane-- look at Aurora. Oh the stories they had about her at Weapon X...) and you had one scary son of a bitch. The feral went soaring over him, however, and Jono landed on his back with a dull thud. Raising his eyes to see where his opponent had landed, he was met with the welcome sight of Kurt Wagner, scowling as he flipped Wild Child over his head, using his opponent's own momentum against him.  And watched as the man landed, cat-like, on his feet, and turned to confront the closest opponent.

Paige.  Who had her back turned, totally oblivious to the threat behind her as her eyes searched the area, looking for other Weapon-X threats.

"Husk!" he shouted, his heart in his throat, a feeling he hadn't experienced in a very, very long time.  She turned toward him, though, and still didn't see Wild Child, who leaped and landed…

On the ground, hard, as a blur sped Paige out of the way and into the air.  His heart sank back down to its proper place in his chest, and out of the corner of his eye he saw Kurt take the fight to Wild Child until the smoke from Kurt's 'ports became too thick to see clearly.  But his attention was drawn by another man, walking calmly toward him, a gun in his hand.

"You didn't think you could get away that easily, did you?" Jackson asked once he got close enough for Jono to hear him, holding the gun in his hand, loosely.  "I warned you, no one leaves Weapon X.  Not even a spy."

"Doesn't matter," Jono lied, shrugging.  "They know everything, I made sure of that, yer bloody wanker.  What yer do to me don't matter."

Jackson grinned.  "It doesn't matter what you told them.  They won't live long enough to spread the word."

"How d'yer know they haven't already?" Jono asked, keeping his eye on the gun and waiting for his opportunity.  Exhausted as he was, he wanted to make sure that gun was an easy target.  Because there was no way he was going to be able to aim with any accuracy.  "Anyways, whatcha waitin for?  Need Kyle to come hold your gun for yer?"

"No, I'll reserve that honor for myself.  Goodbye, Jonothan – I wish things had been different.  You'd have been quite an asset to our organization.  But now – you have a lien on that new face and chest, you know.  If you're not going to pay for it, we'll be repossessing it – now." He raised his gun, which was exactly what Jono'd been waiting for.  He let loose a burst of psionic energy, ripping the gun from Jackson's hand and knocking him flat.  And laughed, walking toward Jackson, who was trying to scramble backwards, like a crab, away from him.

"Give me one good reason I shouldn't rip you a new arsehole, and you _might not _end up like our old friend Sublime." Jono said, nearly choking on the name as he forced it out, the energy in his chest flickering through the control device Weapon X had put in place.

______________________________________________

"Kit, you want some coffee?" she heard Jubilee ask as she sat, eyes closed, in the uncomfortable guest chair in Bobby's hospital room.  "Cuz, if I don't get some caffeine, I'm gonna totally fall asleep."

"Sounds good.  Need money?" Kitty asked as she stood up and stretched, then stuck her hand into her pocket to dig for some change.

"Nah, got it covered," Jubilee assured her.  "Expresso, right?"

"Perfect," Kitty replied as she looked at the other girl.  Jubilee had calmed down since everyone left, but she could still see the concern in her eyes, and the redness around them from the crying she'd done.  "You don't mind…"

"Nah, I'll get it – I could use the walk, anyway," she answered, giving Kitty a half-hearted wave as she walked out the door.

Kitty's eyes followed her out, then turned to the crystalline form in the bed.

Bobby.

And remembered.

_"Kitty!" she'd heard, and turned away from the keyboard she'd been frantically typing on, mouth open to protest his interruption.  There wasn't much time…_

_And watched, as a chunk of the stone ceiling overhead had crashed into Bobby, saw him go down.  _

_Without thinking, she'd left the computer and dove toward him, phasing him through the floor and into the access tunnels below.  And was still there, trying to wake him, when she heard the explosion above. _

_The tunnels had been reinforced with more adamantium than she'd seen in her life; whoever'd booby-trapped the system had wanted to ensure his or her escape if they'd been discovered.  The tunnel shook, a bit, and a little dust fell, coating Bobby's body and her own, but they were otherwise safe._

_The Genoshan city, which had been located too close to the cavern that had housed the data on the origin of the mutate program, hadn't been so lucky.  She could hear the screams, even as far underground as she was; could smell the smoke from the fires ignited by flying, burning debris, could hear buildings collapse from the heat, or the sheer concussive force of the explosion…_

_And knew, deep down, that it was all her fault.  If she'd been faster, smarter, if she hadn't been distracted, none of this would have happened.  She could have stopped it.  Just a few more minutes… Instead, she sat, and cried over the frozen, broken body of Bobby Drake, who had loved her.  Whom she had loved.  And whom she had failed as well…_

Just as she had, now.

"Damn it, Bobby, this can't be happening," she said aloud, looking down at him.  She watched as his chest almost imperceptively rose and fell, the only sign that he was still, somehow, alive.  "You told me it couldn't - nothing can take out the Iceman, you said!

"And I believed you.  All that death, all that destruction – all my fault.  I let my feelings get in the way, I lost my focus - damn it, I thought you were dead, then.  And you fucking woke up and grinned at me, asked me what you missed.  Put yourself back together, and told me nothing could take out the Iceman…"  She realized, suddenly, that she was crying, and rubbed her hand, hard, across her eyes, flinging away the tears only to replace them with new ones.  

"You can't do this, not now.  I don't care if it's a secondary mutation, or nannites, or whatever – you can't die, Bobby.  Too many people need you.  _I_ need you.  I thought you were dead, once, and it nearly killed me then.  It killed a lot of other people, then," she added in a whisper.  "And we couldn't put them back together.  We couldn't even put _us_ back together again.  And that was my fault, too."

"But damnit, I can't go through that again.  I can't.  Jubilee can't; she loves you, you know she does.  You're one of her best friends.  She was bawling her eyes out, earlier; maybe you heard her.  I hope you did, because you're going to have to do something about it.  She can't lose you, not so soon after Angelo.  She shouldn't have to.  I lost way too many people, by the time I was her age.  I've lost way too many," she started crying in earnest, and sat down next to Bobby's bed, took his hand in her own.

"You can't joke your way through this, Bobby.  It's too much.  But you're going to have to do something about it.  You promised, remember?  Nothing can take out the Iceman.  Can't you do something about _this_?" she asked, as all the tears she'd suppressed since the day hundreds of Genoshans had died poured out of her, and she watched, as the frozen chest rose and fell, rose and fell.

____________________________________________

And Bobby heard every word.

_To be continued…_

**The Letter Page!**  (Which still has no name.  Come on guys, help us out!)

Not many reviews last issue – if we really were a Marvel title we'd be in danger of cancellation.  So please, send us your feedback!  You don't want Fallen Angels to be cancelled due to lack of readers, do you?

_Taekwondodo_:  You're right, we were slighting Kurt – and we certainly didn't mean to do that to our resident fuzzy elf!  Hope we made up for it this chapter; we assure you it was completely unintentional.  Apparently what we were trying to do didn't come out quite as well in the story as it had in our heads.  Thanks for keeping us in line!

_The Scribe_:  Hope this met your requirements for Bobby and Kitty-ness – but if it didn't, don't worry, the second half of "Iceman, No More" should be up soon!

_Harry and Risty_:  What happened in Genosha?  Hope this answers your questions.  

_Linzer__-b_:  JP's not acting like JP?  I'd like to think that J-P is growing fonder of his new teammates as they all settle in.  Of course, there are always some exceptions…

_Erin-Starlight and Risty_:  Glad you liked the spotlight on Paige.  We're both relatively new to writing her, so I'm glad she met with your approval.  As for JP warming up to Kitty, well, given the situation they're in, I have to agree with you.  I don't see it happening any time soon.

_Phil Hartman:_  Thank you!  We're glad you're enjoying Fallen Angels so far!

And congrats to everyone who correctly identified our "Angst" character!  The cast of Fallen Angels is now complete.  

_Next Issue_:  Things look pretty bleak for everyone's favorite Iceman, and they take a turn for the worse in the second half of "Iceman, No More," with a special guest appearance by New X-Men's Beast!    _And_ the startling conclusion to Fallen Angels' encounter with Weapon X.  Coming soon, to a computer screen near you!


End file.
